Chapter 232

Nick’s assessment that the main herd wouldn’t be bothered by the disappearance of the rear group held, as he watched them plod southward, eating just about anything in their path.Still, that didn’t mean it would be the case forever. The matriarch he had killed had already proven to be much more intelligent than he initially thought, so he could only expect that the other leaders of the herd would become warier as time went on without the rearguard reappearing.

“If I had infinite reserves of mana, I would already be attacking again, but alas, I do not,” Nick muttered as he circled behind the herd, aiming to scout their path for a good ambush point for the next attack.

The ritual required him to scatter the herd now, to create panic and break up their cohesion via ambush, and he would do that, but he wasn’t about to jump into a fight with a dozen matriarchs without stacking the deck in his favor.

The spiritual storm was still there, lurking just beneath the surface, waiting for a catalyst to bridge the gap between the ether and the material world, but for now, it seemed to have calmed.

Frankly, Nick was surprised by how much power it still held. His experience with rituals that lasted several days told him that mana erosion was the most common issue, and he should have noticed some loss in the past hours, but the storm was still as dense and powerful as when it finished absorbing the matriarch.

If anything, it seemed even more solid now, after some time in the ether.

Finally reaching a hill that overlooked a rushing river, where the waters had carried a seemingly endless supply of white rocks from ancient thaws, he decided to pause for a moment.

“This looks pretty good. I also appreciate the symbolism of the entire ritual being set against a backdrop of water. The Omaha were very interested in storm magic, so this completes the elements. I might even eke out a minor affinity by the end…”

The thunderhoofs were providing the lightning, and of course, Nick was the wind. He’d been willing to accept his washing into the stream the previous day to be enough to pay lip service to the elemental requirements, but this was better.

Still, he now had to set up the ambush, which was easier said than done.

Thunderhoofs as a species weren’t easily spooked. They preferred charging anything that blocked their path and frying anything that threatened them from afar. Though not the apex predator of the grassland, in such numbers, they were essentially an unstoppable force.

To disperse them, Nick would have to either launch a large-scale attack, which he wanted to avoid as much as possible since it would leave him without enough mana to thin the herd afterward, or find a way to convince them they were in such danger that staying together was no longer the safest option.

There was only one way to do that.

Unfortunately, his options were limited by his environment. The grassland was vast and rich in resources, but it lacked any natural features he could easily use, and unleashing the spiritual storm wasn’t likely to succeed, at least as the first move. These things required time and precision to set up, and he’d have to act quickly to ambush such a large herd.

His first plan was to utilize the river. Although the waters weren’t very deep, they flowed pretty fast. Fast enough that, with some tinkering, he was confident he could turn it against the herd.

But where that would be a fatal blow to normal animals, as they would get swept away and drown, the thunderhoofs were an entirely different beast. Though not necessarily larger than Earth’s cows, they were much stronger, and the alphas and matriarchs were more than capable of acting as dams with their powerful physiques.

The most he’d achieve was to annoy them and turn the entirety of the flooded area into a kill zone that would force him to stay in the air, where he’d be easy prey.

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The second option was to start a fire. That would definitely prey on the thunderhoofs’ instincts and force them to scatter if he fanned it enough, and they simply didn’t have ways to suppress it.

But a fire mighty enough to scatter the herd was not something Nick could keep under control for long. He seriously risked it escaping his grip, especially since he’d be using indirect methods like wind magic or to steer it.

No, he probably would cause immense damage to the grassland if he chose that path, and he didn’t want to find out if the dark dwarves were correct—that sowing enough chaos would trigger a response from the dragon.

Ogden didn’t seem like the type to care, but he also had many depths about him that Nick wasn’t aware of.

That left him with one last option. It was a bit of a return to the basics, since it was the method he used the very first time he faced a thunderhoof.

Back then, he had been very limited in his means. had required nearly every ounce of mana he could spare. Now, he could spam it enough to break up the entire floodplain he was overlooking, but that wasn’t his plan, no.

alone wouldn’t be enough for that, no. But it would provide a foundation for him to build a powerful attack.

If he were hunting a flock of birds, he would have gladly settled for conjuring a hurricane. Or really, just about anything but thunderhoofs. They thrived in such environments, and while he was confident he could cause some real damage with his wind magic, it was simply a bad matchup.

Earth magic, on the other hand, suited this occasion perfectly.

The only problem was that Nick lacked the right affinity and knowledge of particularly powerful spells.

Therefore, he would need to recreate such a thing in the aggregate.

The backlash from such a thing was very likely to kill him, so Nick wasn’t eager to find out.

Extending his senses across the floodplain, he hummed, feeling pleased that no monsters seemed to be lingering around. There were a few animals, from insects to mana-less critters, but they wouldn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things.

“I guess it’s time to get to work.”

Preparing the field was a time-honored tradition among mages of all kinds. It was, in fact, the preferred way to fight, and there was a reason why almost no one was foolish enough to attack a mage in their lair.

With enough time and mana, almost anything was achievable. Even on Earth, so lacking in resources, ancient families had transformed their estates into bunkers capable of withstanding nearly anything.

Nick spent several hours until the sun went down and the moon shone brightly behind him, creating patches of weakness in the ground.

Some he only lightly touched, aiming to slow down the fleeing monsters, while others had become true death traps, ready to turn into pits at his command.

All that hard work also had the benefit of infusing the floodplain with his mana, making it easier to implement changes.

He had taken his time, making sure he never dipped below half his reserves, and as he sensed the herd approaching, he stopped entirely, breathing and circulating his energy through his .

Finally, he sensed the bright star that was the leading matriarch enter his field. He did nothing, allowing her to enter, but gradually started assembling the spell he’d been preparing the ground for.

More and more of the herd trudged down the grassy hills of the north, heading for the river to quench their thirst.

The entire floodplain covered only a couple of square miles, barely enough to hold such a large herd in their previous relaxed formation, but Nick quickly noticed that the thunderhoofs were now moving closer together.

It didn’t matter; it was too late.

The moment when the last beast was far enough into the prepared field to make escape impossible, Nick placed his hands on the ground and focused all the mana he had been preparing into a single purpose.

The spell that should have been the simplest form of kinetic magic had been stripped for parts. All the safety features and controls were removed to make room for more energy, and the direction limiters were turned into a single focus.

Shake the ground as hard as possible.

Alone, it wouldn’t have been enough. Even with all of Nick’s effort, he simply couldn’t match the incredible power of a real earthquake.

But cast on a weak point, and on land that had been turned into a barely-held-together jumble of dirt, mud, and stone, it had a terrifying effect.

A loud boom echoed across the grassland, but the thunderhoofs didn’t have time to wonder what it was because the ground beneath their feet started shaking.

Fissures and cracks formed wherever Nick had weakened the structure, sending many beasts to their deaths.

The matriarchs bellowed in anger, sparking with incredible power, but no matter where they looked, the ground kept shaking, and no enemy appeared.

They were soon forced to move when a large crack opened beneath them at Nick’s command, and he was treated to the sight of a matriarch used a falling alpha as a spring to leap away from the hole in the ground.

Lightning sparked as they used their mana to propel themselves away, but as the ground kept shaking, more fissures opened—some beyond the ones Nick had caused.

A domino effect started as the floodplain's overall structure collapsed inward. The empty pockets Nick had created for this purpose caved in, forming sinkholes and dragging many of the beasts down with them.

There were just too many to kill them all right now, but Nick didn’t even intend to do so. The Hunt had two more steps, after all.

So he let the lead matriarch rush her way out of the trembling land, and only then did he unleash the bubbling power surrounding him.

The overwhelming fear and despair his actions had triggered were enough to summon the Spirit Storm, and Nick let it manifest, watching as the ethereal winds started howling over the fractured herd, which even now was trying to escape the death zone he’d created.

Gradually, souls began joining the storm as the weaker thunderhoofs’ spirits shattered on contact. Alphas followed, although some escaped quickly enough to suffer only minor damage, while the matriarchs roared as they jumped over sinkholes and rammed their way through any obstacle.

Nick watched it all with a detached gaze. The plan was coming together.